A WOMAN from Liss who had revolutionary surgery to stop her being confined to a wheelchair has won a class at Crufts with her dog.

The outlook was bleak when Sarah Price was diagnosed with Ehlers Danlos Syndrome aged 27.

This natural sportswoman, who had national success in swimming, trampolining and rowing, was told that she would not compete again as she had arthritis in several key joints.

Rather than having a hip replacement and using a wheelchair before she was 50, she chose to have her pelvis rebuilt – but faced a long road to recovery.

After feeling very low for nine months due to the physical and emotional effects of such a sudden decline in her health, Sarah borrowed her mother Val Tiller’s dog Darcy to cheer her up.

Val had bred Darcy, but Sarah and Darcy became inseparable and it was agreed Sarah should keep her. It became obvious she was a clever canine.

Sarah said: “I took Darcy to the Petersfield and District Dog Training Society, where we worked with Sarah Canham. She got her gold award in no time and Sarah asked if I had ever thought about putting her into obedience competitions. I thought I might as well give it a go, and she has progressed and progressed through the lower classes to the point where this year Darcy and I found ourselves at Crufts.”

They were in The Kennel Club’s Good Citizen Dog Scheme Special Pre-Beginner Obedience Stakes.

Sarah said: “We were 20th out of 20 in the running order so I made a point of not looking at the other results or at what we had to do. I just wanted to concentrate on having a nice clean run.”

At first she did not realise they had sealed victory: “It was only when we were coming off and someone walked up to me and said ‘You do know you have won, don’t you?’. Honestly, my knees sank. It was an incredible feeling.”

Sarah and her husband Mike, who run risk and resilience company Resilius Consulting, are now training Darcy’s two-year-old son Bertie to compete as well.

She said: “It feels like I have been given my life back and gotten to meet so many lovely people in the process. Sarah Canham is still our trainer and she made me into a handler and Darcy into an obedience dog. She is amazing.

“I can’t tell you how it feels when, not so long ago, I was given a disabled blue badge following the pelvis operation, and told that without surgery I would need a walking stick, or be confined to a wheelchair for the rest of my life.”